


Always

by marybethsjournal



Category: Red Dead Redemption (Video Games)
Genre: F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-07
Updated: 2021-02-07
Packaged: 2021-03-12 19:40:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29265912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marybethsjournal/pseuds/marybethsjournal
Summary: Molly has hit a wall with Dutch and doesn’t know what to do; she feels completely lost. Not to mention that she has started to have complicated feeling towards another gang member.
Relationships: Molly O'Shea/Dutch van der Linde, Sadie Adler/Molly O'Shea
Kudos: 4





	Always

It was barely noon and the girls were day drinking yet again. This didn’t impress Molly much, but she had come to realize that nobody, not even Dutch cared about what she thought. Molly pushed the thought away. If she thought about how Dutch had been shutting her out and treating her badly in general, she would be driven to drink just like these harlots. And then she would be no better than them, which seemed to be the most humiliating thought possible at the time.  
Molly was not surprised that Karen was leading the drinking charge of the day. That’s all the wench knew how to do, that and seduce men. She tried not to blame Karen too hard for that, though, because everyone knew Dutch was strongly encouraging her to put herself out there and if Molly verbalized her bias against working women, she’d have to implicate Dutch in the whole thing and she didn’t feel like doing that. Anything to exonerate her man from wrongdoing. What did surprise Molly was that that girl, Sadie, had joined the women for once. And not in the way Abigail had, coming over to get one drink and then gone back to her business (Molly didn’t blame her, she deserved a drink, especially since Jack had asked about 50 questions today already and the Marston man had tried to pants Bill and got a fist in his face in return). Sadie was downing the drinks faster than anyone else; she seemed to have no shame. Molly supposed that maybe she shouldn’t have been so surprised. Sadie had gone through a significant transformation over the past few months. When Sadie had been brought in by Dutch, Micah, and Arthur, she seemed weak and quiet. She had worn dresses and otherwise modest garments, although nothing too fancy. Now, she had the audacity to yell at the men and one day, when out on the town with Arthur, she had bought a shirt and pants and she hadn’t taken them off since. Quite offensive, in Molly’s opinion, but Sadie objectively pulled it off quite well. Molly had noticed herself staring at Sadie quite often, observing the woman. She couldn’t pinpoint quite why, but she assumed it was normal. Sadie was pushing boundaries and was overall quite an interesting woman, more interesting than herself. Not to mention, Sadie was very beautiful. Anyone could see that, it wasn’t an odd thing for her to think.  
Molly found herself in the same situation yet again. She was staring at Sadie, who was downing another drink and laughing at some joke Tilly (or maybe it was Karen??? Molly wasn’t doing a very good job focusing on anything other than Sadie at the moment) made. Molly smiled, seeing Sadie throw her head back in laughter. Her smile was so huge and genuine. It was only recently that she had started smiling again. Sadie had taken it rough, just like any woman would, when her husband died. Molly knew the pain hadn’t gone away, but Sadie seemed to finally be letting herself enjoy life with little guilt. She thought about Sadie’s smile a little longer than she probably should have and her mind ended up drifting to a few nights ago when she and Sadie had danced. The whole camp was ambient with laughter and music, coming both from the gramophone and Javier’s guitar. Everyone seemed to have found a partner and was dancing: Mary Beth with Arthur, Jack with Uncle (their form of dancing was far different than everyone else’s slow dancing, the pair were waving their arms wildly and running in circles together), Karen with Sean, Tilly with Lenny. Hell, even Abigail and that fool John had put aside their differences for the night and were dancing up on each other, a bit too provocatively for Molly’s liking. Molly had actually been really excited about the spontaneous party that night. She felt the distance growing between her and Dutch the past few weeks and she was convinced that that night could make it all better. She had put on her finest dress, fixed her hair, and perfected before asking him. But to her surprise, he told her that he was too tired and maybe they could try another time. Her surprise had turned to horror when she later saw Dutch dancing with Susan. The worst part was, Dutch didn’t even seem to care when Molly noticed. It was like he didn’t even care about her feelings.  
Molly had run into the nearby forest to cry. She knew her makeup would smudge and usually she would refrain from crying to the best of her ability, but she didn’t care anymore. It only took a few minutes before Sadie had snuck up behind her and asked her what was wrong. She had been sitting on a rock nearby, not in a party mood, when she had heard Molly crying, she explained. How embarrassing.  
“So, are you going to tell me what happened so I can fight a bitch?”   
Molly, despite her sadness, laughed. “It’s not really a bitch. It’s Dutch. Wouldn’t dance with me but he sure is dancing with Susan right now.”  
“That old fart? Ah you can do better than him.” Sadie seemed to get an idea and clapped her hands together. “In fact, let’s show him what he’s missing. I’ll dance with ya.”  
Molly was taken aback by Sadie’s proposal.   
“I’m not too sure that’ll make him jealous. Maybe if I danced with Charles or something…”  
“Oh come on! Sorry I’m not Charles.” Sadie grabbed Molly’s hand and drug her back into camp  
Molly was confused as to why Sadie seemed so insistent to dance with her, but she was certainly pleased by the attention. She rarely got attention from this gang.  
The dance went wonderfully; Molly almost felt something resembling butterflies in her stomach, which she dismissed as simple indigestion. It was perfect until Molly apparently got too close to Sadie and she asked, “Miss O’Shea, do you expect me to kiss you or what?”  
Molly was horrified. She gave some phony excuse and ran away from the situation as fast as she could, ignoring Sadie calling after her. Things had been pretty awkward between them since then.  
She was startled out her daydreaming when Karen yelled at her, “Hey Molly, what are you looking at? You wanna drink or something?” Oh great, Molly thought after realizing she had been staring this entire time.  
Molly walked over to where Karen was and for just a brief moment, allowed herself to look at Sadie again. Unfortunately, Sadie seemed to have the same idea. Their eyes locked and Sadie subsequently excused herself to go talk to Abigail.   
“What the Hell is her problem? Anyway, wanna drink? I’ll share mine. It’s the good kind of whiskey.” Karen offered some strong whiskey to Molly. There’s nothing Molly wanted less than to drink after Karen.  
“I try not to drink outside of social settings.” Molly informed Karen, politely declining.  
“Then WHY were you looking at me earlier?”  
“I wasn’t.” Molly responded curtly.  
“Then you were looking at Sadie. Cause I know you weren’t looking at these here two fools.” Karen made rude gestures at Mary Beth and Tilly.   
“I wasn’t looking at anything, Karen. Just thinking.” Molly couldn’t find it within herself to look anywhere besides her feet.  
“Sorry, didn’t mean to offend you. You two, get out of here. I need to talk to Miss O’Shea alone.” Molly tried desperately to get the other two girls to stay but Karen insisted they leave. Apparently, Karen had much more pull among the other women than Molly did. That wasn’t one bit surprising, but it still seemed wrong.  
“Wow, you really don’t wanna talk to me. My feelings are so hurt.” Karen took another swig of her drink before continuing. “Listen Molly, you know just as well as everyone else that I think you’re lazy and entitled. Just all around a nasty person.”  
Molly nodded. Karen generally was straightforward and rude when she wanted to me, but it still seemed the drink must be doing a number on her for her to be able to say what she just had said.  
“But for some reason my the dumb bitch in me has started to care. I didn’t think I had an angel on my shoulder, but here she is, annoying as ever, telling me, ‘Karen, you have to warn Molly. You don’t wanna see her get hurt.’ And then I tell them back that I don’t care if you get hurt but I still feel like I do care afterwards.”  
It didn’t take much of an intellectual to make the observation that Karen had had too much to drink. Molly honestly couldn’t understand what she was saying: it sounded like a whole bunch of incoherent rambling in which she said a whole bunch, yet nothing at all at the same time.  
“I’m not sure I follow.”  
“Of course you wouldn’t. You don’t have a heart of gold like myself. But at least you do have a heart. Listen, I just wanted to let you know Dutch don't care about you.”  
‘“Leave me alone, Karen. You’re drunk and I won’t hear anymore.”  
“See, you know it’s true! He sees you as a toy more than anything. You’re gonna end up hurt and he’s not going to care one bit.”  
“If you think he’s so bad, why are you still running with him?”  
“A lot of us don’t have a choice, miss society lady. Besides, I know better to get involved with him.”  
“Sure, Karen. Thanks, I guess.”  
Molly had walked away and pretended like she hadn’t cared but even days later, the short conversation haunted her at every turn. Even late at night, lying in bed next to Dutch, she replayed the whole ordeal over and over again in her mind. She hated to admit it, but Karen was right. The man lying next to her didn’t feel much for her anymore, if he ever had in the first place. It was just cold lying next to him. Like sleeping with a complete stranger.  
She had spent several consecutive nights not being able to sleep out of worry. Late into the night, she would search Dutch’s face for any sort of sign that maybe he cared about something, maybe not even her. She always came up with nothing.  
It had become all too much for Molly. She found herself crying yet again. She had never known herself to be this emotional. Part of her wanted Dutch to wake up and see her in pain, but she knew in her heart that he wouldn’t care. He would just be irritated that someone interrupted his beauty sleep.  
One night when Molly couldn’t control her crying any longer, she left their tent so as not to disturb Dutch. She walked towards the rock that she usually sat on while she read a book during the day. On her way, she noticed that Sadie was sitting on another rock on the other side of camp. What was she doing out this late. She supposed she would have to find out. Now was her chance to finally talk to Sadie and apologize for whatever had happened between them.  
“Can I sit here with you?” Molly asked Sadie when she approached her.  
“Always.” Sadie smiled at her.  
“That would be nice.”


End file.
